The intoxicating dream of social success lasted but a short time.
Balthazar left Paris, weary of a hollow existence which suited neither
his ardent soul nor his loving heart. Domestic life, so calm, so
tender, which the very name of Flanders recalled to him, seemed far
more fitted to his character and to the aspirations of his heart. No
gilded Parisian salon had effaced from his mind the harmonies of the
panelled parlor and the little garden where his happy childhood had
slipped away. A man must needs be without a home to remain in Paris,
--Paris, the city of cosmopolitans, of men who wed the world, and
clasp her with the arms of Science, Art, or Power.
The son of Flanders came back to Douai, like La Fontaine's pigeon to
its nest; he wept with joy as he re-entered the town on the day of the
Gayant procession,--Gayant, the superstitious luck of Douai, the glory
of Flemish traditions, introduced there at the time the Claes family
had emigrated from Ghent. The death of Balthazar's father and mother
had left the old mansion deserted, and the young man was occupied for
a time in settling its affairs. His first grief over, he wished to
marry; he needed the domestic happiness whose every religious aspect
had fastened upon his mind. He even followed the family custom of
seeking a wife in Ghent, or at Bruges, or Antwerp; but it happened
that no woman whom he met there suited him. Undoubtedly, he had
certain peculiar ideas as to marriage; from his youth he had been
accused of never following the beaten track.
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